Energy mavens from around the world met in Houston last week for IHS CERAWeek, where the economic benefits of natural gas from shale to America’s manufacturing sector proved a popular topic yet again.

America’s chemical manufacturers are especially rebounding from the economic decline, courtesy of abundant and affordable sources of natural gas from shale that the industry uses as a fuel and a raw material, said several energy analysts.

Daniel Yergin, chairman of CERAWeek, described to NBC News the “unfolding oil and gas revolution in the U.S. and the economic impact it has had on jobs, manufacturing and competitiveness.”

John Larson, vice president for economic and public sector consulting at IHS, envisioned a manufacturing renaissance, with onshoring displacing imports.

It’s a revolution in manufacturing. The opportunities are not opportunities of a lifetime, it’s of multiple lifetimes.

Many of these new chemical plants require multi-decades based on long-term planning and major capital spending, according to some industry experts

Nevertheless, Sergey Vasnetsov, senior vice president of strategic planning and transactions at LyondellBasell, emphasized that the future is now when it comes to pursuing chemical manufacturing expansions because the long-term prices of natural gas could fluctuate.

The only drawback in the chemical manufacturing growth could be the increasing difficulty in finding enough engineers and skilled workers needed at the new plants, despite salaries as high as $285,000 a year, up 20 to 50 percent since 2009.